1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an ice maker of a refrigerator, and more particularly, to a water supply control apparatus for an ice maker and method thereof. In the apparatus and method, the amount of water supply to the ice maker is properly controlled according to the pressure of the household water source, thereby allowing stable operation of the ice maker.
2. Description of the Related Art
An ice maker is a device for making ice. For home use, some refrigerators are equipped with the ice maker to provide ice, and more refrigerators are being equipped with the ice maker to satisfy user's taste.
The ice maker requires a water inlet line to receive water from a household water source. Other devices such as a water purifier can be interposed between the water inlet line and the household water source. The user can supply water to the ice maker by simply pressing an ice button formed on a predetermined portion of the refrigerator instead of manually supplying the water.
However, the water pressure of the household water source differs from one house to another. Therefore, water supply time cannot be set equally. For example, an ice maker at a high water pressure area may be supplied with large amount of water in a short time to cause overflow, and an ice maker at a low water pressure area such as a hilly section may be supplied with small amount of water though the water is supplied for a relatively long time to result in undesired small-sized ice. To obviate this problem, the water supply time must be adjusted depending on the pressure (speed) of the water in the water inlet line: a short time for a high speed and a long time for a low speed.
According to a related art method for obviating the problem, the size of water passage of the water inlet line is adjusted depending on the water pressure of the household water source when the ice maker is installed for the first time. However, this method has a drawback in that the adjustment work should be repeated when the water pressure is changed for some reason such as when the user moves to a new house.
According to another method, the user can adjust the water supply time to make the ice with a desired size. However, this alternative method is not suitable for users who are not familiar with the ice maker. Also, since the user does not know the approximate ice size for the ice maker, it is hard for the user to adjust the water supply time.
Therefore, there is a need for an apparatus and method that can automatically adjust the amount of water supply to the ice maker.